


Don't Eat That Horse

by Silverfox



Category: Napoleonic Era RPF, Temeraire - Naomi Novik
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-30
Updated: 2018-12-30
Packaged: 2019-09-30 14:07:40
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 347
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17225471
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Silverfox/pseuds/Silverfox
Summary: Marshal Ney has found his dragon. He just doesn't know it yet. (And Napoleon won't be pleased.)Therefore I present Marshal Ney and Findling the dragon.





	Don't Eat That Horse

Marshal Ney found Findling hopping around excitedly just outside the small dragon pavilion he shared with several other courier dragons of little consequence. At the sight of the marshal the dragon interrupted his hopping to give a squeal of delight and announce: “Voila! Voila! Oh, voila!”

Ney looked around, but saw nothing out of the ordinary. But then, even a small dragon like Findling was a lot taller than any human and might see over obstacles Ney would not. “Voire quoi?”

“Ca! Ca! Macht dididi!” Findling did his best to explain. “Voila!”

Makes dididi? Ah, that. “C'est ecoutez.”

“Que was?”

“Vous voulaiz dire ecoutez, pas voila,” Ney explained with a patience that would have surprised most of his soldiers. “Voila,” he repeated pointing at his eyes, “Et ecoutez,” pointing at his ears.

“Ah! Oh! Ecu-tez! Ja! Ecu-tez! Schööön!” And he started to dance about again.

Ney ducked out of the way as the dragon's black and white scaled tail whipped past him and against the wall where it left an ugly dent.

“Ce sont des clochettes,” Ney explained pointing at the sleigh being pulled up street towards them by a nervously dancing horse that would obviously much rather go elsewhere.

While Ney generally didn't approve of cowardice even he thought the horse had a point. He wasn't sure whether the dragons had been fed today yet, but one thing he did know for sure was that Findling at last wasn't above eating his meat uncooked.

“Clo.. was?” Findling enquired.

“Des clochettes. Glöckchen.” He knew he shouldn't speak German with Findling. The dragon's language was mixed up badly enough as it was and French would be much more useful to him, but sometimes it helped their communication to draw a connection to a familiar German word.

“Glöckchen?”

“Qui, des petittes clochettes aux harnais du cheval.”

“Cheval gut,” Findling remarked. “Findling Hunger. Manger?”

That's what he had been afraid of. “Non, cette cheval n'est pas a manger.”

“Manger cheval?”

“Non. Pas d'cheval, pas d'dididi.” He'd said he liked the sound after all.

“Nicht manger?”

“Qui: Pas manger. Nicht essen.”


End file.
